Sometimes I Feel like Kurtz in The Heart of Darkness
Published August 14th, 2001 | 
“The horror! The horror!” – Mr. Kurtz
“I don’t know how you bear up so well under the pressures of incoming idiocy. I’d be ducking and have a bad back, lol.” Janet Buck, author of Calamity’s Quilt, in a message to ‘the mad editor.
You can start publishing the work of others with the best of intentions, but sooner or later, the submissions will close-in on you. The parade of egos, wannabes and idiots is endless. Sometimes, I can identify with Mr. Kurtz, the good company man who went mad in the congo in Joseph Conrad’s classic novella. And you may ask, “Why would anyone put up with this if it aggravates him so much?” The answer is simple: Unsolicited submissions are the life’s blood of any publication, whether big or small, online or offline. It is worth the aggravation of reading through thousands of bad submissions in order to find that one good piece of writing you want to publish.
Of course, you might think, “Why put yourself through that when it is easier to solicit work from a select group of writers whose work you like?”
Several reasons:
1. Even good writers aren’t immune to writing garbage. Therefore, one cannot guarantee that the material solicited will prove usable.
2. An open submission policy guarantees a steady influx of new material. You can afford to be more selective.
3. Experienced writers like to be published alongside their contemporaries and the talented beginner likes to be published alongside the known, experienced writer. Therefore, a closed submission policy is the kiss of death for any publication. It is the editor’s responsibility to find the right mix of the fresh and familiar to hold the reader’s attention and keep them coming back for more.
4. The writers themselves can prove to be your best, most loyal audience. However, they will ignore a publication if they are unable to submit to it. They recommend publications they admire.
So, if you want to publish a literary magazine or e-zine, you’d do well to open your door to unsolicited submissions. And if you are a writer — keep submitting, even if you aren’t very, because you can’t win if you don’t play and you can’t grow without taking your lumps.
The Assassin
Published August 3rd, 2001 | His name was Marcus
six-feet-four over four-
hundred pounds of
lumbering bulk hired,
I’m sure, to replace me.
He can lift whole pallets,
they said with one hand
have you seen anyone
that strong before.
Every year it happened — they’d
find someone they thought was
more dependable than me who
they were willing to pay more
to keep on the payroll instead
of giving me that raise.
Marcus showed-up early, did
the work of three men… at least
for the first two weeks. After that
nothing could move that mountain
as he’d sit unshaven blood-shot eyes
all day testing the resolve
of the office furniture.
He’s gone now.
Dance Around Like a Puppet but Don’t Get Caught-up in the Wires
Published April 21st, 2001 | “To write simply is as difficult as being good.” –Maugham
Isn’t it the truth? I’ve seen beginning writers (and even more experienced writers, who should know better) load their writing with all kinds of language devices because they think it sounds more poetic. In reality, it only makes the writing difficult to read and enjoy. Writing is hard, but the reader shouldn’t be able to see the work that went into it. Think I’m wrong? Then ask yourself why Hemingway sells more books dead then he did while still alive. Further, ask yourself why Proust doesn’t. It’s no great task, really, to throw in a lot of fluffy figurative language, pile one metaphor on top of another, stretch it all out like so much silly putty and plop it down on a page with such strained, affectation that the reader would swear you were giving birth to a monster. But to compress all that complexity into a simple turn of phrase that’s easily understood WITHOUT resorting to cliche? Now, that’s a major talent!
The problem is many writers are either lazy or clueless. The first draft is easy and fun, usually. Whether you are writing a poem or a long work, like a novel, you are free to fall in love with the voices in your head. You are free to go off on a tear and just lay it down. However, if you are unable or unwilling to cut the useless junk out of your piece, what you will end-up with is a mess of words your average reader will dismiss.
To me, writing simply and clearly is like putting on a puppet show. A bad puppeteer is clumsy. He mixes-up his lines and the puppet gets tangled-up in its own wires. The audience is too distracted by the puppeteer’s ineptitude to enjoy the show. Bad writing is much the same. The language may be pretty, but it’s unclear and has no reason for being there other than its apparent preciousness. The reader merely trips over the words. In a good puppet show, the audience pays attention to the performance, laughs when they are supposed to laugh and they don’t notice the puppet master or the wires the puppet is suspended from. Good writing doesn’t distract the reader with fluff.
